Dr Charles Benbrook is a leading US agronomist and former Executive
Director of the Board on Agriculture for the US National Academy of Sciences.
The comments below were made in response to an invitation to address a
fact finding mission on GM crops sent by the Zambian Government which has
concerns over GM contaminated food aid sent to Zambia without prior notification.
Dr Benbrook notes,

'..there is no shortage of non-GMO foods which could be offered to Zambia
by public and private donors To a large extent, this "crisis" has been
manufactured (might I say, "engineered") by those looking for a new source
of traction in the evolving global debate over agricultural biotechnology.
To use the needs of Zambians to score "political points" on behalf of biotechnology
strikes many as unethical and indeed shameless.'

The question is now becoming, just how far will the industry's supporters,
in the US administration and elsehwere, go in order to score such points?
The US is refusing even to pay for the milling of the GM contaminated aid,
which would at least lessen the chances of its being used as seed.

Carol Thompson, a political economist at Northern Arizona University,
has commented, "It is highly unethical not to just cover the costs for
milling. Tell me how much it costs to drop one bomb on Afghanistan. Who
is starving whom here?"
[http://ngin.tripod.com/020802e.htm]

***

September 13, 2002

Dear Distinguished Delegates from Zambia:

I am looking forward very much to a chance to visit with you via the
phone on Friday afternoon. I apologize for not being able to get to Washington,
D.C. to meet in person. I would have liked to do that very much, but it
is a long way from North Idaho to the East Coast.

I am hopeful that your fact finding mission will convince you of a few
key points, which should inform and guide your actions in the future as
you deal with your country's unfolding food security challenges.

First, there is no shortage of non-GMO foods which could be offered
to Zambia by public and private donors. To a large extent, this "crisis"
has been manufactured (might I say, "engineered") by those looking for
a new source of traction in the evolving global debate over agricultural
biotechnology. To use the needs of Zambians to score "political points"
on behalf of biotechnology strikes many as unethical and indeed shameless.

Second, if and when GMO corn is planted in Zambia, some degree of gene
flow will occur to native varieties. There is universal agreement on this
point now in the global scientific community. The more GMO corn planted,
the more diverse its geographic spread, the faster and more complete the
movement of transgenes will be into Zambian land races, i.e., your native
corn varieties. Biotech advocates will argue that this is a good thing
-- that Zambia is getting the benefit of "advanced" traits without having
to pay for them. You should reject this silly notion. The movement of biotech
traits into your varieties will almost certainly not be of practical benefit,
since levels of expression and the consistency of expression will be inadequate
to provide farmers with a meaningful level of insect control. Indeed, it
is more likely that gene flow will create some unexpected, and under certain
circumstances damaging, physiological growth problems, or perhaps impairment
of natural plant defense mechanisms.

Third, the flow of genes into Zambian corn varieties will almost certainly
be detectable. Once it becomes known that GMO corn is growing in Zambia,
European and Japanese buyers will insist upon a system to certify that
Zambian corn was not produced from GMO seeds. Putting such a system in
place, while possible, will prove costly, and indeed even the United States
has not been able to do so, except for the organic market sector.

Fourth, when the companies advanced Bt corn through the regulatory process
in the U.S. and Europe in the early 1990s, it was known and understood
that 98% plus of the corn would be processed or fed to animals.

If regulatory authorities had felt that a sizable portion of the
populations of people consuming this corn would eat it directly (largely
unprocessed) and that moreover, the corn might make up as much as half
or two-thirds of daily caloric intake, they would NEVER have approved it
based on the human safety data presented at the time. Anyone who claims
that U.S. and European regulatory reviews "prove" safety in the context
of food aid to Africa is either ignorant of the factual basis of U.S. and
European regulatory reviews, or is willing to make some rather major assumptions.
In the final analysis, Bt corn might prove to be just as safe to humans
when eaten directly and making up a large percent of the diet, but today,
no one can point to a solid set of scientific studies that support this
conclusion. Put simply, these questions have not arisen before and have
not been the subject of any research, to the best of my knowledge. Perhaps
other experts or the U.S. State Department will be able to provide you
with such studies.

Fifth, people in Africa who are suffering acute or chronic malnutrition
may react to consumption of Bt corn, especially when minimally cooked and
processed and present as a major share of their diet, in different ways
than the average American or European has reacted to it, given how it has
been incorporated in the food supply in North America and Europe. It is
known that Bt corn may have adverse impacts on the stomach lining and that
some potential food safety/allergenicity impacts are a function of gut
bacteria and the overall health status of the GI tract. It is unlikely
that any company or institution has carried out any research to determine
whether these differences could translate into risks in Africa among the
very hungry, risks that are both qualitatively and quantitatively distinct
from those that might be expected in North America and Europe.

And sixth, the agronomic benefits of today's Bt corn varieties in the
United States have been marginal, given that the target pest, the
European corn borer (ECB) is an episodic pest in most corn growing regions
and does not do much damage in most years. My research has shown that the
premium price paid by farmers since 1996 for Bt corn seed varieties has
been a poor investment averaged out across the whole nation. Where ECB
levels have been high and consistent, Bt corn has clearly paid for itself.
But on about two-thirds of planted acres each year, it clearly reduces
per acre profits. The information and technology exists in the U.S. to
target Bt corn to high-risk acres, but this approach is not compatible
with biotechnology and seed company marketing and financial plans/objectives,
and for this reason, this approach is the "road not taken." As Zambia looks
to the tools of biotechnology to improve the productivity of your farming
sector, it will be important for Zambians to define the needs and the ways
that this technology can be used in order for Zambia to be, and remain
the beneficiary of progress made.

I am sure your hosts in Washington will provide you copies of
various reports that substantiate the above points. You will also find
much information on our website, Ag BioTech InfoNet, http://www.biotech-info.net/.